


Purgatorium

by VisualStain



Series: Creative Writing Challenges [5]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Demons, Leviathans, Likely overuse of italics, Purgatory, Shipwrecks, The first of many religious or mythological stories I will post
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-05
Updated: 2018-04-05
Packaged: 2019-04-19 00:27:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14225133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VisualStain/pseuds/VisualStain
Summary: A deserted island, what fun! And apparently, it isn't as "deserted" as Als thought at first glance. Where is he? How will he get home? And most importantly, who is that woman?Based on the prompt: Your character is marooned on an island. As your character is trying to find food and make shelter, he/she realizes that the island is not of the human world. What’s worse, your character is not alone. Make a story on how your character deals with this situation he/she is in.





	Purgatorium

**Author's Note:**

> Another fun fact: I love mythology and religion. A lot of my stories have elements of one or both.

Pale green eyes blink open slowly, chasing away the hazy fog of unconsciousness. Als leaned up slowly, avoiding moving too quickly on account of his pulse pounding in his head. Once his vision cleared, he looked around. He was on a beach, but he didn’t remember it at all. Where was he even? How did he get here? 

The last thing Als could remember was being on a ship in the middle of a storm. Nothing before or after that. That was just the only thing in his memory. The next thing he knew, he woke up here. 

He shook his blonde hair out, watching as little bits of sand flew out into his view. He stood up, and as he stumbled, he realized that a strange feeling had settled deep into his body. Something didn't feel right, something felt very wrong. As he made his way to the distant tree line, Als realized what was wrong. 

The trees were all dead. It wasn’t the middle of the winter type of dead either, it was far too warm for that. These trees were dead, probably hadn’t been alive for years, but somehow they all managed to remain standing. Als looked up among the bone like branches as he realized how quiet it was. There were no animals, no sounds of life. The unsettled feeling inside Als strengthened. 

Despite this, he decided to keep walking. He knew that if he was to survive on this island, he needed to find sources of shelter, food, and water. Hopefully before the sun went down. Als walked through the dead forest, and eventually came to a lake.

It was out of place in the dead landscape. He leaned down by its edge and noticed shadowy tendrils floating throughout its depths. Even when he squinted, Als noticed that despite the fairly clear water, he couldn’t see the bottom. He reached out two hands to bring some water to his mouth. 

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you. The Leviathan gets hungry.” Stopping dead in his tracks, Als quickly turned around to face who had spoken. It was a woman, except she didn’t look human. 

Her skin was a storm cloud grey, her eyes were a light blue where they should’ve been white, black where there should have been color, and white where there should’ve been black. Her long black hair fell in tendrils around her, seeming to defy gravity in the way that they swayed even without wind to aid them. Even though she was wearing no clothes, Als found that the sight that he couldn’t tear his eyes from was on her head. Spiraling dark blue horns curled upwards from the top of her head and ended in sharp looking points.

Als quickly stood up and moved sideways, still facing the woman, so that he’d have an escape route behind him instead of the lake. “Who the hell are you?  _ What  _ are you?” 

The woman smiled, as if enjoying her own personal joke. “You may call me Lili. As for what I am,” her grin turned feral, revealing sharp teeth, “I’m every man, woman, and child’s worst nightmare.” 

Lili took a step closer to Als and he backed up two steps. Her smile shrunk slightly and an expression of mocked hurt came across her face. She held a hand up to her breast, where a heart on a human would have been.

“Oh, how rude, and after going through all this trouble to make myself presentable. Didn’t your mother ever teach you that’s no way to treat a lady? Much less one who saved you,” She said. 

“Saved me? What do you mean?” Als demanded. Lili motioned to the lake where a lone fish now swam desperately on the surface. 

“Watch.” Before Als could even blink, the fish was struggling in the grip of one of the dark tendrils from before. The tendril raised out of the air, before plunging into the depths of the lake. Als shuddered as he realized that that fish could have been him.

Lili laughed, “I told you the Leviathan gets hungry.” 

“Where the  _ hell  _ are we?” Als demanded, he could barely hear over the pounding of his heart.

“Oh, still so fearless after all of that? I like you.”

She was wrong, Als was afraid. 

“Anyways, we aren’t in Hell… yet. We’re in Purgatory, but it’s my job to bring you there.” 

Als froze up, and Lili took the chance to walk closer. “You see, little boy, you were  _ very, very,  _ naughty in your life. So naughty, in fact, that God himself has given up on you!” She laughed. As she drew ever nearer, Als found his control again.

“Get away from me you monster!” Lili stopped, an actual expression of hurt flashing across her face, before it was quickly replaced with rage.

“ _ I’m _ a monster?  _ Me? You’re  _ the real monster here! All I did was want to be equal, but you, oh you  _ deserve _ to go to Hell! You can’t even remember, can you? It will come back in time, and when it does, I can assure you it will be painful.” Lili’s voice was loud until that last promising statement.

A sudden wind kicked up, and blue flames began to lick their way up Lili’s body. “I suggest you come nice and quietly with me now. Or I can guarantee that you will be dragged down in  _ goddamned flames _ .”

Als ran. He ran until he approached the water on the beach, and he stopped to regain his breath. He looked into the water and startled back. It wasn’t water anymore. What was supposed to be the ocean now looked like tar, smoke running through the dense surface.

Als turned and kept running. He didn’t know where to go. He had to get off this island, but he had a feeling that wasn’t an option to him anymore. Als came to a clearing in the forest and tripped, clutching his head. All he could feel was immense pain throughout his body, and flashes of memories came back to him.

_ Lighting, rain, a slippery deck. A boat rocking. He slipped, there was no railing to catch him. Falling, water surrounding him. He didn’t know how to swim. His head hit a rock. Bubbles came from his mouth. His vision grew black around the edges. He couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t move. His vision turned black. He stopped breathing. He drowned. He died. _

Als gasped for breath and felt the back of his head. There was blood there. He still couldn’t breathe. Als coughed up water, he kneeled on the ground choking as much water out as he could. He noticed there was no end to it, but he hadn’t lost consciousness. A movement came from behind him, but Als was too absorbed in the pain from the salt water stinging his throat to notice. 

“I told you it would hurt. It’s only going to get worse too.” A voice came around from behind him to in front. Lili lifted his chin to make him face her.

Her eyes were no longer multicolored, instead they were fully blue. Her skin had turned as black as an abyss. Her hair was the same color, still twirling as if it had a mind of its own, instead now it came down to her ankles. Her horns had grown and darkened in color so that they were a deep navy. There was still anger in her gaze, but there was also pity. 

Als noticed that all the grass under her feet had caught flame and died. The blue flames had twirled up her body, giving Lili a dress made of fire. Her claws dug into his chin where she forced his head up.

“It’s only going to get worse from here. You caused a lot of pain in your life, you still have to experience that.” Lili started to smile, her sharp grin sending feelings of dread through Als.

“After all, that’s your punishment, you have the pleasure of feeling unbearable pain for all of eternity.” The flames started to spread. They circles around the pair, and they worked their way down Lili’s arm, onto Als. Als found that he couldn’t even scream.

The pain was overwhelming. Every bit of his flesh was on fire, there was no numbing even after his nerves had burned. Lili stepped away to watch her work. Filled with morbid curiosity at what the blue flames were doing to his body, Als looked down at his hands. There was no fire. 

Als’s skin was turning from gray to black. He felt his eyes burning. He felt his teeth sharpening. He felt horns burst from the back of his head, curling around front, blood spattering on the ground.

Lili smiled, and fire surrounded them once more, this time it didn’t hurt. Als felt the ground shift beneath him and the world shifted in his vision. The smell of sulfur and brimstone assaulted his heightened senses as he closed his eyes tightly.

Lilith laughed. “Welcome to Hell. Alastor, Executioner Demon.”


End file.
